Food
- Master or Servant?
Overweight
is becoming normal - assuming that by normal you mean what
most people do. Normal doesn't mean healthy or best.
Why?
Why
is food controlling the minds of so many people? This must
be what is happening because the body isn't designed to be
fat. It is designed to store fat, but that's something completely
different.
What
bodies have are mechanisms that create sensations that are
understood as time to start looking for something to eat.
These sensations we call hunger. And sensations that are understood
as time to stop eating. These sensations we call satiety or
fullness. If we only took notice of these sensations and started
to look for something to eat when we felt hungry and stopped
eating the minute we felt sated, it is unlikely that anyone
would have a problem with excess weight.
So
why don't people listen to their bodies any more?
Maybe
because food has become something it was never intended to
be - the Master.
A
typical day for many people:
Wake up - Breakfast
Spend morning looking forward to break time
and snack
Spend rest of morning looking forward to lunchtime
Clock decides when it is time to eat lunch
Spend afternoon looking forward to break time
and snack
Spend rest of afternoon looking forward to going home time
and eating a meal.
Clock decides when it is time for evening meal
Watch TV
Have supper (clock or commercial breaks decide time
for supper)
Just
have a look at your own day and see what it is in you that
dictates when and what you eat. If it isn't internal feelings
or sensations then food is your Master.
And yes, I know that when we are employed it isn't possible
to eat at any other time than official breaks. I'm not suggesting
that you can be doing anything other than what you are doing.
I'm just drawing your attention to what is actually going
on.
The
art of cooking, using fresh ingredients, is dying. You only
have to look around any supermarket to see the vast number
of ready meals, and the amount of money that is invested in
meals that are 95% fat free (which is just another way of
saying that one-twentieth of this meal is pure fat), or gives
the impression that it has been lovingly cooked just for someone
who wants to eat more healthily. Why are these foods so popular?
They are popular because they carry the subliminal promise
of continuing to allow food to be your Master while not suffering
any adverse consequences - like unattractiveness. And because
everyone wants to be seen as attractive, the lie is accepted.
Eating
is undeniably a pleasurable activity - especially when the
food contains a reasonable amount of fat (fat makes food palatable)
and/or a reasonable amount of sugar.
The
trouble is that manufactured food has very little flavour.
It has plenty of sodium, and spices, and herbs, and chemicals,
and garlic to fool your mouth into thinking there's some flavour,
and it frequently has added colour so it looks more palatable
than it actually is. Real food has flavour. And real food
satisfies so there is a greater experience of pleasure, and
satisfaction is reached sooner, so less is required. If you
want to experience real flavour - get yourself a plant pot,
fill it with soil-based compost, place it in a sunny spot,
and sow some carrot seed in spring. Pull the carrots when
they are about two or three inches long, wipe them, and bite.
If
you want a healthy body, and you want to be just the right
weight for that body, then for you to achieve that you have
to want it more than you want to eat. Or you have to find
something that gives you more pleasure than food and have
that instead. That way you don't have to give up anything.
So start to notice the eating triggers - those things that
dictate to you that it's time to eat something. When one of
the triggers goes off, just check in with your body and sense
if it feels hungry or not. If it does, by all means have something
to eat, but after every few mouthfuls just check in again
and see if your body is starting to feel full. If it is then
just stop eating and forget about how much food is left on
the plate, and forget about how much you paid for it too.
If
you feel you have to eat at specific times, then just do the
fullness check.
Doing
this will put your food back into its rightful place as servant
and give you back control of your life.
Many
people with a weight problem, don't really know what Healthy
Hunger feels like, so they can't correctly interpret the messages
that their body sends. If you want to experience Healthy Hunger,
and you are in good health, then just don't eat anything for
24 hours, and only drink water - as much of this as you want.
If you have any concerns about this, or you have health problems
other than weight, then be sure to consult your doctor for
advice before engaging with this exercise. Be sure you do
this on a day when you can rest and take gentle exercise,
and be sure that you don't engage in any activities where
concentration is needed for your safety. By the end of the
24 hours you should have a nice sensation that suggests eating
something nutritious would feel good, so break your fast with
some juicy, sweet, fruit. After this you will become aware
of a much gentler pleasurable sensation that says it's time
to start preparing some food. This sensation of Healthy Hunger
is there to assist us in enjoying and obtaining greater pleasure
from what we eat. So instead of looking forward to mealtime,
look forward to feeling hungry.
But
don't forget that if you choose to no longer be influenced
by the pictures on the packets of food from the factory (and
remember that prepared food comes from a factory - it's just
the picture on the packet that was taken in a kitchen), then
you release yourself to buy delicious, fresh, maybe even organic,
fruits, nuts, meats and vegetables. If your body is fed well-cooked
wholesome foods it will be satisfied more easily.
So
make a choice right now to be in control.
And
remember all you have to do is simply:
Eat when you're hungry.
Stop when you're full
And enjoy every mouthful.
This
isn't a restrictive diet.
Nothing
is banned.
It's
a recipe for pleasurable weight loss.
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